Plastic fantastic — Dutch on brink of ridding oceans of plastic

Boyan Slat is your dose of good news this morning. The Dutch 22 year-old’s project is to rid the world’s oceans of plastic waste. After three years work and millions of dollars in crowd-funding, his Ocean Clean-Upinitiative has a working prototype and a growing band of supporters.

The problem: Bad human habits and the world’s ocean currents have conspired to suck a large percentage of the world’s ocean waste into part of the Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and California. Scientists and campaigners knew the problem was bad but before Ocean Cleanup, they hadn’t been able to measure it in detail, and their best ideas to fix it would have taken 79,000 years to implement, Slat says. Using 30 vessels and the first ever aerial survey of the waste, Slat says his team collected more information in one month than in the previous 40 years. The problem was also much worse than originally estimated.

The proposed solution: An array of plastic barriers — each possibly two kilometers or more in length (“like a big curtain in the sea” Slat said), to trap plastic (including most micro plastic pieces down to less than one centimeter in size) where the currents cause it to gravitate. No nets are used, which Slat said is key to avoiding harm to fish and other aquatic life. So far €25 million from mainly private funding has been raised to develop the barriers.

What’s the business model? Expand the project with funding from companies (including those that produce and sell plastics) keen to bolster their green credentials. Slat wants to sell all the plastic that is removed from the ocean as “material with a story.” In other words: recycle it and build it into products for upmarket consumers, to allow funding of additional clean-up efforts. “We want to go all the way up the value chain,” he said, showing Playbook his sunglasses, made of frames built from reclaimed fishing nets, to prove the concept.

What’s the catch? So far there is no U.N. rule preventing the clean-up from taking place. But there are unanswered questions about what happens when the plastic is brought onshore: is it classified as waste, as an import to be taxed, or something else?

The next step: Another trial of the latest barrier prototype in the Netherlands in April.

— This post was updated to reflect a higher amount of funding already raised.